Tag Archives: translation

Translating your content into multiple languages can help you expand your business to global markets and increase your brand prominence abroad. Quality is key to your global success, therefore you should make sure the translations you get are accurate, error-free and clearly understood by your target audience.

Although there is no specific formula you can use to measure quality, especially in a language that you don’t speak, there are several ways to ensure a positive outcome before, during and after the translation process. Use this checklist of quick tips and you’ll be able to effectively speak to your customers in their native language.

Be willing to invest in translation: If you think translation quality is not important, then think again! Low-quality translations may not only damage your company’s reputation but may also cost you a lot of time and money. If you want to get high-quality, professional translation, you need to have a budget for it.

Choose your translation provider wisely: With so many translation agencies out there, it’s hard to know which one you should trust. But if you do your homework, you can find some useful information that will help you pick the right translation provider for your organization. Make sure this provider has expertise in your industry by checking their current clients.

Plan ahead: Once you decide to have your content translated, you should contact your translation provider as soon as possible. Remember, a good translation takes time – it may take the same time as creating the content. If you expect large volumes or short turnaround times, you should inform your translation provider in advance, so they can plan their resources accordingly.

Prepare your content for translation: A great translation starts with a great source text. You cannot expect the translation to improve upon the poor quality of the original. Ask from your copywriters to be concise and clear, and to double-check the content they create for grammar, spelling and punctuation errors. When it comes to software strings, try to include comments and/or screenshots, so as to provide the translators with as much context as possible. This will help you prevent back-and-forth communications and speed up the translation process.

Collaborate closely with your translation provider: Translation is a difficult process. Providing precise instructions, reference material, glossaries and style guides, not only could make this process easier, but it could also ensure high-quality results from the start. In case of queries or clarifications, try to answer to all questions promptly and clearly and, what is most important, listen carefully to your translators’ concerns and be open to their suggestions.

Use third-party evaluation services: A great way to assess the quality of your translated content is to have a third-party provider review it. Third-party reviews add value to your content if they are performed by experienced, in-country linguists who have a good understanding of the local market and your brand, are not focused on mere error detection, and approach the initial translation in a collaborative and not competitive way.

Ask your audience: The best way to evaluate the quality of your translated content is to ask feedback from your users. Consider adding a feedback/rating feature to find out whether your content is clearly understood. This way you will get useful information about the quality of your translations directly from your customers, and you will be able to improve your content.

According to a recent report, the corporate eLearning (or eTraining) market is constantly growing and it seems that this tendency will continue in the coming years. This comes as no surprise given that the business world is already lead by new-generation employees who are more independent and like to do everything in their own way, and the fact that eLearning is a cost-effective solution compared to the in-class training.

In our internationalized era, where content can reach global audiences in the blink of an eye, the choice to localize eLearning content is self-evident. Therefore, if you are considering creating an eLearning course that will be subsequently localized in one or many foreign languages, there are certain points to take into account:

English is the main language most organizations choose to create their eLearning courses and thus International English is the recommended variation to adopt for the development of your online course. At this stage, it is very important to create culture-neutral content. Avoid idiomatic expressions, colloquialisms and country-specific references, extracts from literature or poetry as this may pose certain restrictions in the translation process. Use humor cautiously as it is very culture-centric. What is considered humorous in one country might be offensive in another.

Carefully examine your target audience and consider issues related to their geographic location, customs associated with the audience, certain language requirements or possible restrictions that may occur in the localization process (for example, right-to-left languages and their support in various platforms, various language variations and the appropriateness of the translatable content for these languages).

A picture is worth a thousand words. An image is, in many cases, a strong means to back a certain theory or illustrate an idea in a clearer way. So, it is essential to choose culturally appropriate and acceptable images for the target audience. Try to opt for neutral images of people, humanoid images or vector images. The aim is always to have a natural target result to achieve the desired purpose. It is also advisable to avoid adding text into images. Texts within the images may increase cost and time, as there is a certain amount of extra work involved in the extraction and import of the text.

Audio: choose the right narrator for your audience. It is very important to know that in some cultures, as in the Middle-East and South Asia, people expect the voice of the narrator to be very authoritative and firm. In other cultures, as in Western countries, people would expect a friendly, informal tone. Make sure your narrator sounds professional for the intended audience.

Use the appropriate authoring tools to create your eLearning courses (Articulate Storyline, Adobe Captivate, and Lectora Inspire to name a few), as they provide a choice to export the course content into an MS-Word or XML document with just a click. These formats are easily supported by the software used by translators and translation service providers and once translated, they can be imported back with yet another click.

Keep in mind that some languages are wordy and the translated content may expand by 30 to 50% compared to the English original. This means that you need to provide ample space in your course for this purpose and possibly provide more time for reading before releasing the next text block in the screen.

Make sure the content can run in most platforms, including mobile devices, which appears to be the most widely used means for viewing eLearning content.

Hire professionals. Professional native translators who are subject matter experts (SMEs) possess the skills required to incorporate appropriate cultural variations and terminology into the translated version. Choose to work closely with your translation partner sharing meaningful information for the correct understanding of your intended message.

First of all, you need to embrace the fact that this risk is real. Be proactive at the early stages of project planning and try to accurately interpret project requirements. Adopt a risk management methodology and try to spot any future problems, needs and setbacks. Whether that is poor scope stability, time consuming processes or insufficient project prep time, you need to identify and eliminate all major shortcomings. Setting clear goals from the start will help you avoid extra work and possible delays.

Lakein’s Law: Failing to plan is planning to fail

Quite often, when project managers receive tight-turnaround projects they rush into execution without doing the proper preparation and planning first. But it is exactly in those cases when we lack time to plan, that we should take the time to plan. Very often, at the early stages of a project, when no one is doing actual project work, rather they are engaged in project preparation, analysis and planning, this is often wrongly interpreted as doing nothing. Yet when it comes to project planning, you should take the time you need. Do not give the go-ahead unless you are certain that you have gathered all the necessary information and covered all aspects of the project.

Parkinson’s Law: Work expands to fill the time available

You have a week to finish a proposal, and yet you wait until Friday afternoon to finalize it. You have two months to work on a localization project and you make the last QA checks 2 hours before delivery. Do those scenarios ring a bell?

Another example of Parkinson’s Law is cases when you have a whole week to complete a 2-hour task. When you have all this time on your hands, there is a good chance that this task will creep up in complexity and become more intimidating so as to fill a whole week. It doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s extra work that will fill up all the extra time, it might just be the stress and tension about having to get it done. These situations can be nerve-racking and mentally challenging. To avoid them, set clear deadlines for all project stages, from vendor hand-off to QA, DTP, LSO and final delivery to client. Impose strict but reasonable time constraints for every project step and make the whole team stick to them.

Cohn’s Law: The more time you spend in reporting on what you are doing, the less time you have to do anything

Avoid long, unproductive discussions and meetings. A successful meeting should be all about sharing ideas, asking the right questions and finding the right answers and should only be held if it adds value to the project. Pick the right team members to attend the meeting, assign responsibilities, focus on solutions and end the meeting with action items.

The same goes for written reports. Avoid long, extremely detailed reports. Nobody has the time (or actually wants) to read a 10-page report on the progress of a project. Make sure it’s accurate and contains all the right information but keep it short and simple!

Constantine’s Law: A fool with a tool is still a fool

Software tools are meant to make our work (and life) easier. But with the vast range of translation management programs, CRM software and CAT tools that are offered in the translation market, sometimes we get so overwhelmed that our work ends up being more complicated than it should. Primarily, try to leverage the software you already have at your disposal and make sure you are using all the features it has to offer. If you are experimenting with new tools, do your homework first, then choose the ones that fit your business and make sure you get a proper and thorough training.

Kinser’s Law: About the time you finish doing something, you know enough to start

Do a post-mortem after every major project or in defined intervals for ongoing projects. Sometimes that would be a simple “What have we learnt doing this?” and other times it will be a complete report on time, cost and performance.

Part of it is also measuring the success of your project. A project constitutes as successful if it results in profit, if it brings new knowledge to the organization, if it helps the business expand to new markets or if it improves the existing processes.

Also, try to have your post-mortem directly after a project concludes, while the details are still fresh in your mind. After a while, we tend to forget the things that went wrong in a well-executed project and vice versa. If a project doesn’t go that well, we lose sight of successes as we try to figure out what the problems were.

*This article was part of the 1st edition of “The Elia Handbook for Smart PMs” published by the European Language Industry Association

“What do you do?” I am asked. “I am a translator”, I reply. “Wow, you must know many foreign languages!”. I get that a lot. And I understand that this must be one of the most common misconceptions concerning a professional translator: The number of the languages known: Two (one source language and one target language) are enough. Of course the more the merrier, nevertheless a translator is not a multilingual dictionary, ready to provide the equivalent of the source language in, let’s say, ten target languages. Two languages are enough, provided that they are known in depth and that they are handled with responsibility.

“Was your grandmother French?” I am also frequently asked. When I reply no, she wasn’t, the question that usually follows is “Then how did you learn to speak French?” Well, I studied. And then I studied some more. And this brings us to the second myth: It is not about cultural heritage, it is all about hard work. A professional translator has to study hard in order to gain his/her credentials, to gain the trust of his/her clients, of his/her peers. A university degree, often a master’s degree are today’s prerequisites to becoming a translator.

“It must be easy to do the translation, if you know the language”. You must have heard that as well. Well, it is not. A translator takes the responsibility of his/her words, which can define other people’s lives when used in a court of law or in the case of medical translation. A professional translator does not provide the general context of the original text to the client, but the exact words that may change the client’s life forever. So let’s break the third myth: Translation is serious work. It requires dedication, scrupulousness, attention to detail and endless patience.

“But what is taking you so long?” clients often ask and who can blame them? After all, it is only translation. But let’s be clear. We are not transcribing, we are translating and that makes all the difference in the world. An English word can have five to seven different meanings in Greek and choosing the right one can require time, research and many queries. This leads us to breaking the fourth myth: Translation can take time. And as all serious businesses, it costs money, but it pays off and if it is done right it never goes unnoticed.

Translation is no more or no less than any other profession. It is not suitable for amateurs, for the faint of heart, as it requires in-depth knowledge and much time. But it can also be rewarding, fun, interesting and life-changing, as any journey that is worth taking.

This is a very good question for businesses wanting to expand their activities beyond their boundaries and go global. Even though English is a commonly used language in many markets, talking to people in a language they understand in depth seems to achieve much better results.

If we take a step back and consider the role of global marketing or the reasons why businesses want to expand in foreign markets, we will start to see the usefulness of the content adaptation to the language the audience understands best. Businesses want to become global for two basic reasons: increase their sales and boost their brand’s reach. The fastest road to increase sales is awareness – through an effectively localized marketing content, that will be global and local at the same time. Global because it will still convey the same consistent message of a business throughout the world and local because it will be customized in a way to reflect the experiences, the values and the culture of prospective local clients. The fundamental purpose of marketing is to penetrate the target audience and get closer to people. This can be achieved only through the language the audience understands best, as this language will become the means to draw their attention, make them want to learn more, and finally persuade them that the promoted product or service is what they really need.

Even if people tend to use English terminology in some industries, the whole communication still needs to be in the audience’s native language as this is the only way the message can resonate with them and touch their heart and mind – leading them to the decision-making process. The language that people understand is the one they will use to search content, read articles, or view a quick video ad from their devices during their free time – it is also the language in which they will share the information with their friends. It is more than obvious that this is the way for businesses to create a personal connection with consumers. The traditional patterns of the one-size marketing campaigns seem to progressively give way to more personalized and interactive approaches. Going even further, localization in marketing material can be the key for differentiation.

That said, we can easily assume that what we need here is not just translation but localization in its full meaning – adaptation, customization and creativity, taking into account differentiation. This is the field where localization can be really fruitful. Modern tools open the way to localization for videos, interactive content and anything that could create a one-to-multiple, but also personal relationship with people, anywhere in the world. Studies have shown that marketing globalization can bring a drastically improved return on marketing expenses.

At this point, it would worth mentioning the role of Machine Translation. It has become one of the main trends in the localization world and we cannot ignore the advantages it can bring in terms of costs and time efficiency. However, its use in marketing content has been greatly debated. If we consider, as mentioned above, that translation in the traditional meaning of the term would not be remotely enough, we can easily assume that marketing material wouldn’t be the ideal candidate for Machine Translation, where the different nuances of a language are usually left out of the whole process. And, most importantly, we would lose authenticity. Marketing localization is a process that can be developed exclusively between humans. The original message should be felt and conveyed to evoke the same feelings to other people. There is no machine that can feel and adapt content and create feelings from one culture to another. This is also a way for businesses to show that they really care for their audiences…

The pressure for price reductions holds strong throughout markets and industries, both for products and services, for many years now and will continue to do so for many years to come. However, according to the law of supply and demand, a low supply and a high demand increases price, while the greater the supply and the lower the demand, the lower the price tends to fall.

For parties in the translation industry, it is common knowledge and a topic visited often in conferences that reliable, experienced and qualified translators and editors are not that many – no matter the language pair – and even if someone argues that they are, then usually it is their availability that is limited or they are lacking in specialization – always compared to the demand!

So, the first half of the law should apply here, right? The answer is “no”! Despite the very optimistic predictions for the growth of the industry, compared to the stability or even slump in other industries due to the recent financial crisis, the pressure for price reductions in the translation and localization industry is more than ever. Why is that? Maybe because translation is considered as an afterthought in the development of any given product, and often of so little visibility that it gets a tiny bit of the allocated budget, if any? Maybe because we, as professionals in the field, have not fought enough to elevate our ‘product’ to the place it should be in our buyers’ minds? Maybe because technology has taken its toll? Maybe because non-professionals have entered the profession offering ridiculously low rates for a respectively low-quality ‘product’? You can pick and choose, but I would not want to get into that.

Instead, let’s take this for granted and see how we can respond to that fact in a way that is respectful of our customers, our businesses and our resources, and still lead a viable business.

Let’s start by trying to understand our customers’ needs and educate them on our workflow and its importance for their end ‘product’.

There are certain steps a text must go through before a high-quality translation can be delivered. Of course, there is a reason for that and it’s not out of a whim that localization agencies favor the translation & editing process, nor because we want to add to our customers’ spend. Language is flexible. Language is subjective. Language is preferential. Language is also fixed and objective (i.e. industry terminology). Humans create language and they choose how to do it, and each individual may choose a different way, a different word, a different meaning… and all may be saying the same thing! So, yes, humans need to be involved in your translation projects, and the more they are involved, the better it is for you and your content, because the more chances there are that their translation gets closer to YOUR way, to YOUR word, to YOUR meaning. How much time, effort and energy have you put in and how many different people have you involved in the creation of your content, or even your ’slogan’? If you think about it, from enough to too much. So, if it was so challenging to settle on a phrase or to finalize your initial content, how can its translation be considered an easy task, especially when it involves many different markets and cultures?

Our advice would be that you should not try to save from compromising processes and eliminating steps (which correspond to people). Instead you should try to locate what you really need to translate and into which languages, evaluate and streamline your translation processes. If this is something new to you or you don’t know how to go about it, ask us; we can help.

And some more seasoned translation & localization services buyers might question the role of humans and ask where technology is in all that. Although, technology was late to enter our industry and help us benefit, there are quite a few tools that can facilitate our work, and the savings time-wise have been translated to real savings for the customers. Customers must always make sure that their language service provider reflects those savings from CAT tools in their invoice offering discounted rates for previously translated (fully or partially) content. Another new trend is machine translation (MT). It is undeniably a considerable advancement in our industry and will most probably play a huge role in how the future of localization will be shaped, but it does not have a universal application. It can serve as a first draft in some types of fixed-language texts, like manuals, to increase the speed and the performance of human translators, and free machine translation engines can be used to give you the gist of a text for your personal understanding; but, raw MT output is not ‘publishable’ text — at least not yet and not where the message matters. Ιt is merely usable in only some language pairs and in no case does it serve the broad spectrum of the languages of the world, it cannot cater for more creative content, and don’t think of only sophisticated marketing content, just try to machine translate your Facebook status update and see what the engine comes up with in various languages.

In every case, we need to invest in and make the most of all available tools and technologies, not only to save money for our customers but to also streamline and standardize our processes, facilitate our project managers and our linguists, monitor and report on our workflows, and lead a transparent and healthy business.

In terms of business practices, price reductions are usually pushed down to the lower levels of the supply chain, which can either be us as agencies or our external resources. In both cases though, this level involves the actual people who do the actual work, and these are indeed those of value to the customer. In the same way agencies recruit for expertise and knowledge, and train their in-house staff to new trends, tools and methodologies to optimize efficiency, the same investment should be considered for external collaborators. Individuals have invested both time and money to specialize and should be able to keep doing so if they are to continue to efficiently support us and, of course, our customers. Hence, although, regular flows and high volumes or long-term projects can of course justify a negotiation to a certain extent, crunching fees should not be adopted as a standard practice, as it is important that all parties involved in this transaction, be it the customer, the intermediary(ies) or the resources, feel that this is a mutually beneficial relationship.

Ultimately, I feel that the way we conduct our business will determine the quality of customers we attract; fair and reasonable practices will most probably attract fair and reasonable customers, and talent will gravitate towards places it can grow.

Last May, Commit obtained the ISO 17100 certification on translation services, the successor standard to our EN 15038 certification. The fact that we have been EN 15038-certified for the past 5 years eased the transition for us, since our processes were already established and very similar to the ones described in the new standard. Nevertheless, despite its distinguishing differences from the old EN 15038 standard, the new standard also came with some interesting added benefits.

What exactly is the ISO 17100 standard?

The ISO 17100 is the new internationally recognized standard for translation companies and it covers the essential processes for providing translation services. It sets the requirements for the core processes, resources and other aspects of a quality translation service that meets applicable specifications. Applicable specifications can include those of the client, of the translation service provider and of any other relevant legislation, industry codes, or best-practice guides.

The ISO 17100 standard integrates terminology used in the translation field and it simplifies the interaction between clients and translators in terms of their contractual needs.

What are the main differences from the EN 15038 standard?

The ISO 17100 standard was based on the EN 15038 standard but it has a different structure and focuses more on conventional translation processes. It sets minimum translation standards, such as the requirement for translations to be subject to revision by a second person, but gives the flexibility to design processes so that they are in line with the respective requirements.

The new standard pays particular attention to the qualification of all parties involved in the production process of a translation: translators, reviewers and proof-readers. It also adds new requirements regarding the competence of project managers who need to have the necessary skills at hand in order to complete the job.

Another process on which the ISO 17100 standard elaborates is the work involved in the preparation of translation projects. It clarifies that the responsibility for the preparation does not just rest with the contractor, but the client as well. The client needs to provide all the necessary information required at the beginning of a project and he needs to work closely with the language service provider in order to achieve their common goal.

This standard is also the first one that underlines the need for following up on translation projects. Client feedback is necessary and valuable for each translation project as it is used as an indicator for the client’s perceived satisfaction and serves as a basis for future improvement.

What are the added benefits of the standard?

Being ISO 17000 certified, the translation service provider can prove the quality of their services via a fully traceable system:

The customer’s valuable data are backed up and can be retrieved at any time.

The customers can rest assured that their projects are handled by qualified professionals following strictly defined processes which leave minimum margin for mistakes and customer complaints.

The ongoing effort to always comply with the standard requirements make the employees follow a professional development program and the well-defined processes and procedures they have to follow always keep them highly efficient.

“The ISO 17000 standard serves as an excellent proof of quality for our clients and vendors”, says Annita Kontoyianni, Production & QA Manager at Commit. “In the course of getting ISO 17000-certified, we drafted a new Company Policy with a uniform set of guidelines, instructions and requirements that helped us further standardize our processes. This uniformity in our procedures leaves little room for delays and errors, and ensures our clients receive top-notch quality services”.

Are you considering taking your first steps in the global market, in an attempt to reach international audiences with your products or services? With the use of social media and the Internet, the world has become a much smaller place. Our society is globally connected and many people around the world can now access your products or services. But going global is no easy task! It requires time, effort and money. Read our 10 tips below and make sure you’re on the right track.

Analyze the situation. Before deciding to go global with your business ask yourself the following 2 questions: Is there enough of your target market in a given area to support business? Does your product have global appeal? If the answer to both questions is yes, then you can continue to Tip No2.

Do your homework. Research the marketplace you want to enter. Who are the key players? What is the competition like? What are the trends and preferences of the country in question? Performing an in-depth market research will help you determine your target audience and define your sales approach to better promote your brand.

Localize your brand.According to a survey conducted by Common Sense Advisory, named “Can’t Read, Won’t Buy: Why Language Matters on Global Websites”, 72.4% of consumers say they would be more likely to buy a product with information in their own language and 2% of consumers say that the ability to obtain information in their own language is more important than price. Imagine that! Data shows that localizing content for specific markets multiplies the desired selling effect substantially and people are even willing to pay more if they receive information in their own language. Are you convinced already?

Use a professional translation agency from the early start. Whether you need an interpreter for your first corporate meeting or a complete localization of your website and marketing collateral, make sure to use professionals to achieve the desired effect. When you are dealing with business terminology, you’ll easily find out that “Google Translate” most probably won’t cover your needs. In fact, it can end up embarrassing your business and having the exact adverse effects from the ones you were hoping for. Also, by translating your content with Google Translate, you are uploading it to the Internet, so bye bye confidentiality! On the other hand, a language services provider will use native, certified translators whose expertise matches your type of content, experienced project managers and industry-leading localization tools ensuring consistency, confidentiality and reduced costs.

Make communications easy. If you’re aiming at global expansion, you’ll need to be in constant communication with distributors, sales reps and clients. Phone and e-mail communication can be impersonal, so start using alternatives like online-video conferencing.

Travel, travel, travel. As far as communication goes, Skype and FaceTime have helped a lot, but they are still not the same as speaking to your clients, sales reps and vendors face-to-face. Plan frequent visits to your target country to keep track of your operations’ progress.

Buy or partner up. The easiest way to enter a market affordably is to acquire a smaller business that already has local presence. This gives you instant market entry, inside knowledge of the target market and experienced quality staff.

Find the right Sales reps, Managers and Subject Matter Experts. This is both very important and very difficult. According to Eric Markowitz of Inc.com “finding the right people to help sell your product is often the difference between success and failure. If you have to choose between reps, pick a person who knows the market to someone who knows your product. Very often you can teach a person about a product or a brand, but it’s very hard to teach someone about a market.”

Study rules and regulations overseas. Research business regulations in each country you want to do business in, make sure your product does not violate any regulations and check all rules for trademarks and copyrights. Your company might be subject to unfamiliar regulations so you might want to prepare yourself.

Market your top products or services first. Your company might have a long list of amazing products but in order to break into a new market you have to invest your time and effort on the one product that will sell itself. When choosing this product, you should take into account its main differentiator that separates it from all the other products in the specific market.

A translation glossary contains a list of a company’s key terminology in the source language and the approved translations in the target language. It can also contain other content specific data and variables such as context, language varieties, definition and approval date or a list of terms that should not be translated such as brand names and slogans. The glossary will help the translator easily identify these terms and follow the client-approved methodology.

What should we include in it?

We should include all key company or project specific terms such as:

Brand/Company names

Product names

Trademarks

Corporate slogans

Acronyms

UI buttons and options

Frequently used terms

Units of measure

Non-translatable terms

The process of creating one

Depending on the project, a glossary can be created either at the beginning or after we have gathered a significant amount of translated documents for an account. Using automated glossary extraction technology that identify terms based on their frequency and use in texts, these apps provide a list of terms and their translations that serve as a first, raw edition of a glossary. Then these terms need to be validated for correct usage by the Language Services Provider and by the client’s local reviewers.

Ensuring consistency

In any good translation, consistency is key. A glossary helps to eliminate uncertainty about specific troubling terms, thus ensuring consistency between the translated versions of a company’s documentation. Maintaining consistency is even more important if more than one translation resource is involved in the translation process. In case of tight deadlines, many translators may be working on various documents of a project simultaneously in order to meet a specific deadline. Without a glossary and specific guidelines laid at the beginning of the project, each linguist will end up using the translation that he/she sees fit and you might end up with two, three or even more versions of a term. For example, haven’t you ever noticed when a User Guide prompts you to click on a button that is worded differently in the software itself? This would have been avoided if a glossary was created and shared with the linguists up front.

Less time for translation

When translators are confused and uncertain about specific terms, they will send queries. Query management and answering requires a significant amount of time and as a result, slows down the translation process. A comprehensive glossary will help minimize translators’ questions and will increase their speed. In fast turnaround projects, when there is almost no time for a back-and-forth of queries between the linguists and the client, an existing glossary can prove to be a life-saver!

Reducing costs

As we all know time is money! By having a glossary of terms, not only can translation companies minimize the query management procedure, but they can also automate certain processes, such as quality checks, and make translation more cost-effective for the client.

A work in progress

Think of your translation glossary as a work in progress, a living, breathing document that needs to be constantly updated with new terms. If your translators come up with a new frequently used term or if they have questions about a particular term, then this should be added in the glossary. The glossary should grow along with your business, your services and your products, and it will end up being your most valuable asset for quality translations.

On February 11th and 12th 2016, the European Language Industry Association (ELIA) held its first Together Conference in Barcelona, Spain and Commit was there!

The moto of the event was “Developing our Connections” and it aimed in bringing together freelance language professionals and companies. The conference consisted of three streams: Relationships, Growth and Technology with the purpose of covering every aspect of the LSP-vendor relationship.

During the conference we got to connect with many freelance translators and other language industry stakeholders from all around the world and had the chance to exchange views on “hot” industry topics.

The Conference started with the “Welcome to Together 2016” session, followed by the keynote speech “Stronger Together: revitalizing the agency-freelancer relationship”, held by Stephen Lang, where he stressed that the agency – freelancer relationship is the foundation of our industry. We left the session having a better understanding and appreciation of our counterparts and their respective challenges.

We also attended the “Keys to effective relationships between agencies and freelance translators” presented by Robert Sette. It was an enlightening presentation under the Relationships stream exploring “both sides of the coin” in situations of placing/accepting translation projects.

Sue Leschen presented “Confidentiality issues and problems for interpreters and translators working with LSPs”, explaining that defining confidentiality is problematic as it doesn’t necessarily mean the same thing to everybody in the language services industry.

The Panel consisting of Sarah Griffin-Mason, Dr. Ana Hoffmeister and Anu Carnegie – Brown “Tailored certification and training for freelancers based on ISO 17100 and the role of LSPs in translator continuing professional development (CPD)” provided unique experiences of a certification concept for freelancers which was piloted in 2015 and will soon be available in German-speaking areas.

Josef Kubovsky tackled the issue “Can enterprise, LSPs and freelance language professionals work together in a transparent way?” whereas Maria Kania-Tasak presented the “The LSP X Factor” just before the Closing ceremony.

Last but not least, it must be mentioned that the ELIA Together 2016 was held in one of the most beautiful European cities, Barcelona. The venue was the World Trade Center, a lovely seaside conference and business center located at the heart of Barcelona, just a few minutes from downtown and the tourist-filled Las Ramblas street. The proximity to the city center along with the great Spanish weather added much to the success of the event.

Commit enjoyed the ELIA Together Conference very much and wishes all the best to all participants! See you in Berlin next February for Together 2017!